First Love

"Tell me when did I lose my first love?  Where did the fire and passion go?  Burn in me a holy fire.  Give me back my lost desire and restore in me the love I felt for you."   ~Avalon, First Love 1999

When you walk through a devastating loss there is real trauma caused.  With trauma comes debilitating fear and flashbacks called PTSD.  My counselor was the first person/resource to open my eyes to the possibility that losing Jaxson was a trauma and may well have come with symptoms of PTSD.

For those of you reading this who immediately just thought, "Well that's certainly an overreaction," I was with you for awhile.  Had the exact same thought.  Now I'm not so sure.

Trauma breaks something so deep down inside you that the depths of its effects might not come to light for some time.

I thought I wasn't naive.  I "knew" getting pregnant again would come with it's own set of challenges. I "knew" it wouldn't solve all my problems or fill that hole left in me by losing Jaxson and Kiwi.  I "knew" I'd experience new sets of fears.  I did NOT know it would surface some of those deep-seeded fears that were sown in trauma.  I did not know how deeply I would feel the fear of losing another.  I did not know how deeply I would question my faith in God's ability to carry us through these 9 months.  I did not know I would push Him away to protect my heart. I thought the joy of finally getting pregnant again would trump every other emotion.  It didn't.  It doesn't.

I've held God at arms-length just in case He breaks my heart again.  I uncover new anger at Him every day.  I cling even more tightly and futilely to what little control I have over this little life growing inside me.

Then today I decided I needed a little retreat to work through some of these emotions.  Repent.  Learn to trust again.  Worship.  Pray.

I stumbled upon a song in my worship book that was my undoing:

We've been crumbled, we've been crushed
City walls have turned to dust
Broken hands and blistered feet
We walk for miles to find relief

When the thief takes, when our hopes cave
You build us back
You build us back

When the earth shakes, when the world breaks
You build us back
You build us back

We are scared, we are poor
All our safety nets are torn
We've been humbled to our knees
From these ruins, we believe

When the thief takes, when our hopes cave
You build us back
You build us back

When the earth shakes, when the world breaks
You build us back
You build us back

Redeemer, redeem us
Restorer, restore us
Oh build us back
Though the mountains be shaken, the hills be removed
Your unfailing love remains
After all that's been taken, Your promise, still sacred
You build us back with precious stones

When the thief takes, when our hopes cave
You build us back
You build us back

When the earth shakes, when the world breaks
You build us back
You build us back

Only our God can repair this kind of brokenness.  Only our God forgives my level of faithlessness.  Only our God loves so unconditionally that he promises to build back the ruins left behind by our traumas.  What other God can I turn to?  Who gives the deep peace I need so badly?  Whose steady love rocks my fears to sleep and gently brushes them away?  Who orchestrates my songbook to flip to the one song that would meet me where my heart is at when I refused to open the pages of His Words to find Him there?  Why would he be so patient?  So kind?  So gentle with my failures?  Because He loves with a love that no human can understand.  I need only to take His word for it.  And one day at a time to let Him prove that no matter where this life leads He promises NEVER to leave me or forsake me...especially when I need him the most. 

Rambling thoughts on pregnancy after loss

Tomorrow I will be 15 weeks pregnant with my 3rd baby. 

I grew up in a family of 3 kids and I always swore (I know, you're really not supposed to do that) I would NEVER (you're not supposed to say that either) have 3 kids. snicker.

Well, well.  I mean, it's not exactly the same since my Jaxson and Kiwi babies are in heaven and not making messes in my house but the irony of being momma to 3 babies is not lost on me.

We announced to the world a week or so ago after having waited until I was solidly in my second trimester and doctors across the board were giving tentative thumbs up.  I kinda felt like a little celebrity in my tiny town of 1,800 people because the day after we posted on Facebook I saw at least a thousand of those people at the Elementary school holiday bazaar and each stopped by my Scentsy table to congratulate me and give me tender hugs.

When we lost Jax in 2012 our little town rallied around us; bringing us meals, sending flowers and "girlfriend, we're thinking of you" packages.  Someone drew me a pencil sketch of Jaxson in Jesus's arms.  Someone else gave me a necklace with his birthstone with room for more stones with more babies.  Others caught onto my obsession with birds since Jaxson was my baby bird and my house is now filled with mementos of him in various bird forms.  Our little town has always made me feel like they lost him too and they miss him too even though they didn't get to hold his tiny 1 pound body. 

So now that we are expecting again I feel like everyone is expecting our miracle along with us.  Can I just tell you how rare and amazing a feeling that is?  To feel like your home away from home is family just the same?  Thank you, Oroville.  You are our family here and we love you and cannot thank you all enough.

I don't suppose I can accurately describe what it feels like to be pregnant after 2 losses especially if you haven't experienced the loss of a child.  It's a complete bundle of excitement, nervous energy, some sleeplessness, paranoia, germiphobia, jealousy (yes, jealousy...the green-eyed monster, once moved-in, doesn't leave easily), fear, joy, curiosity, control-freak-ness, and lots of other emotions.  Being the type of person who naturally experiences multiple emotions at one time it's that feeling on steroids. 

I'm considered high-risk now and that means supplementing hormones, more dr appointments, more ultrasounds, etc.  This equates to = more nausea, more fatigue, more anxiety, and more questions than last time.  What happened with Jax?  Will it happen again?  Can we prevent it?  The list of stuff I'm avoiding is longer than usual.  I think if Ken had his way he would duct tape me to the couch and leave me there until May.  Poor guy.  He's a saint.  A SAINT, people.  I haven't cooked him a decent meal, besides Thanksgiving, since before I left town on Sabbatical in September.  He's gaining sympathy pounds and not a bit happy about it.  Sorry, Babe.  I can't imagine how he must feel.  Being the sort of person who keeps everything inside anyway, I feel his hesitation to be very excited until we get closer and closer to term.  Believe me...I get that.  But it's different for me, obviously, because I am feeling every part of this pregnancy in every part of my body already.  I can't NOT think about this baby 24 hours day.  I suppose work is helping him keep his sanity so he doesn't just wander around our house wringing his hands for the next 6 months.

But the whole thing about being hesitantly excited?  yeah.  tentatively joyful.  It's a weird mixture of pure bliss that my body finally figured out how to conceive again and sheer terror that I won't survive another loss.  Generally people with my type of story call a pregnancy after loss a Rainbow Baby but I really hate that term...at least at the moment.  It's not a rainbow baby until he/she's here. 
in my arms. 
crying.
sleeping.
eating.
pooping. 

Does that show a lack of faith?  If it does I don't know how to fix it.  Nobody ever promised me I'd be a mom here on earth and they aren't promising it now so I have to live day by day.  Each morning I wake up and my first thoughts are, "take your meds!" and after that it's, "let's make it another day, Baby."  Gimme one more day.  One more week.  One more month.  Slowly, by God's grace we might make it to May. 

And then, if everybody's prayers are heard and answered, you'll be here. 
In my arms. 
And I'll finally get to take you home...
and one day hear you call me Mom.

Withering

I was sitting out on my front porch the other day and notice my impatiens hanging basket was withering again.  Withering in the blasted heat that's blazed over our town this summer.  Withering from a wind storm that came through last week and took off most of it's blooms.  Withering from a serious lack of consistent watering.

Because of the terrible, early heat I gave up on my beloved garden this year...I'm generally so thankful to be on city amenities as opposed to a septic system or irrigation water but I would have given my right arm for the unlimited, life-giving water from the irrigation district this summer.  I probably wouldn't have abandoned my plants otherwise but all my watering was keeping pitifully small plants green with no growth.  What was the point?  I'd keep going over my allotted city water allowance and still wouldn't get any fruit.  So I stopped watering the garden and nearly stopped watering the hanging baskets.

The result has been sad little baskets with puny blooms and ever-withering leaves.

I couldn't help but see the metaphor for several other areas of my life.  Namely, my physical, emotional and spiritual health.

Each area has taken a good beating.  I'm feeling banged up, bruised, weak, and depleted.  The heat was turned on and never really brought back down to a manageable level.  I've been blown and tossed around...because of some things completely out of my control and because of sets of choices I'm completely responsible for.

I feel like I regularly douse my life with a good-long watering in one of these areas only to leave it to dry up, depleted of nutrients for days on end later.  I'll spend a bunch of time in worship one day letting the music soothe and cleanse my dry spirit but I won't consistently let the music flow through my life in a steady stream.  I'll commit to eating great and will stick with it for a few days; choosing nutrient-laden foods, cutting out the junk, and drinking plenty of water to detox.  Eventually my lack of self-control gets the better of me and I drop the charade instead letting my body run off fumes of protein and fiber and slogging through sugar, fat, carbs and caffeine.  I'll get together with a dear friend and let life-affirming conversation build me up and encourage me but eventually depression, scheduling conflicts and busyness creeps in and keeps me from connecting on a regular basis leaving me feeling lonely and isolated.

My withered hanging basket might technically have a plant in it but it's not a pretty plant.  It's not thriving or blooming or giving off a fragrance.  It droops and sags and even if I get it to perk up once in awhile it'll take dedicated care to get it back to it's former glory. 

Ahh the dedication, self-control and discipline it takes to nurture a plant, a garden, a heart, and a body.  It takes making the right choices over and over and over.  Especially when you don't "want" to.  It takes hanging on long enough to see results to make you want to to see it through. 

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.  ~Galatians 6:9

As if...I only wish I owned this backyard! 

TTC

Trying to have a baby sucks.

Whether it's just taking a long time or in my case: risking another after a tragic loss, TTC (trying to conceive...there are lots of acronyms in this world) is filled with worry, stress, impatience, calendars, temperatures, charting, too much information and...MEDICATION.

I don't even know how women trying IVF do it.  I'm just taking Clomid and I think I'm going crazy.  IVF medications and procedures are so much more costly, time consuming, stressful and side-effects prone.  Reason No #456 why I don't want to do IVF.  I'd never survive.

At first I thought I was so lucky...the 3 rounds of Clomid at the regular dose had almost no effect on me.  My Dr and I were both thrilled.  No down side!  But those rounds didn't work so we upped the ante with 3 rounds of a double dose.  At first I was just a little dizzy and I thought, no prob...I can handle this.  And it went away so I thought I was good. 

I just finished taking my second round at the double dose and lately I've been surprised at how hungry I am.  I mean, I can eat. But it's more than that...it's a ravenousness and feeling never satisfied.  After a couple of week of that unrelenting feeling I started thinking, maybe this is the Clomid!  Well after that door opened in my head I realized Clomid may also be to blame for other weirdness...namely, a deepening depression. 

Oh. My. Goodness. the depression.  I thought I was depressed after losing Jaxson.  But honestly? This has been worse.  While you grieve and mourn after a sudden loss it's a bit surreal and you feel sort of out of your body.  Not every emotion sinks down deep.  I was so anxious to try again and I was completely sure it would be easier for me to get pregnant a second time.

After 3 years and another loss the waiting gets to you.  And now I'm compounding the problem with medication trying to end the problem.  It's a lose-lose. 

I don't really even know why I'm writing this particular blog.  I guess I just want to open up this part of my heart...expose the part that would rather gloss over all this waiting and trying and telling people I'm doing OK when, in fact, I'm actually drowning.  I'm wandering deeper into the Dark Night of my Soul...I thought I'd been there 3 years ago.  This is worse.  The not knowing.  The hopelessness.  The misunderstandings.  The fear that this season will never be over.  The watching over and over as others welcome healthy, beautiful babies in their arms. 

Knowing this medication is to blame helps a little.  It explains a lot and fills in a few blanks.  Maybe I'm not crazy.  Maybe this too shall pass.  Maybe this will be the last round.  Maybe it'll be my turn next.  Maybe...

If you know other women who are TTC...please be patient with them.  Please don't spout platitudes or tell them to relax or to stop trying cuz then it'll just magically happen.  Please don't tell them to just adopt like that's a no-big-deal kind of decision.  Please don't tell them stories about how so-and-so took this weird plant extract and stood on her head for an hour every other day and that's how she got pregnant.  Please don't tell them it'll happen when it's the right time and now is not it.  None of it helps.  None of it. 

And please, please be patient with them, us, me.  That girl you know who is struggling to have a baby might be on a medication that makes her feel like a monster took over her body.  She might be in the middle of the biggest crisis of faith she's ever experienced.  She might be feeling crazy so she acts crazy.  Just go with it.  And love her anyway.

Offended at God

The word of God is ALIVE and ACTIVE... ~Hebrews 4:12a

Have you ever had revelation from the scripture that is entirely new?  As in, you've read a verse a hundred times and then suddenly one day it jumps off the page at you perfectly timed for a specific situation you are facing?  I love that the Word of God truly is divinely inspired words that apply to our lives in FRESH and active ways!

I'm in the middle of a fantastic morning devotion/study right now called Anointed, Transformed, Redeemed and I'm currently in the section written by Beth Moore: (I highly recommend it!)

A study on the life of King David, I'm finding that these 3 women authoring the study have insight to scripture far exceeding the few verses that encapsulate parts of his story. So much so that I'm writing this blog to share the latest study notes with you...fasten your seatbelts!!

Then David again gathered all the elite troops in Israel, 30,000 in all and led them to Baalah of Judah to bring back the Ark of God, which bears the name of the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, who is enthroned between the cherubim. They placed the Ark of God on a new cart and brought it from Abinadab’s house, which was on a hill. Uzzah and Ahio, Abinadab’s sons, were guiding the cart that carried the Ark of God.  Ahio walked in front of the Ark.  David and all the people of Israel were celebrating before the Lord, singing songs and playing all kinds of musical instruments—lyres, harps, tambourines, castanets, and cymbals.  ~2 Samuel 6:1-5  NLT

Now don't do what I do: jump ahead to what you know is about to happen.  Stay here on these verses as if they are the only part of the story you know so far: David and all of Jerusalem are celebrating with all their might the bringing of the Presence of God back home!  Think of a time when you were excited beyond belief for a particular event...something thrilling!  Something you were absolutely sure would be a time of blessing.  Now if you know what happens next...think of a time when your excitement was suddenly and thoroughly cut short by pain and suffering:

But when they arrived at the threshing floor of Nacon, the oxen stumbled, and Uzzah reached out his hand and steadied the Ark of God.  Then the Lord’s anger was aroused against Uzzah, and God struck him dead because of this. So Uzzah died right there beside the Ark of God. ~verses 6 &7

For the purposes of mining more out of the word of God I want you to momentarily disregard the fact that we know Uzzah was struck dead because of his disobedience of touching the sacred ark and the fact that David wasn't supposed to transport the ark on a new cart anyway.  In my judgment of their disobedience I have missed some very human emotions I can learn from.  Yes they disobeyed, but they were also trying to celebrate something wonderful and instead something devastating happened.

In my own life I have had two seasons of celebrating the anticipation of a new baby to arrive in my arms only to have my excitement cut devastatingly short by the untimely deaths of both little ones.  I know what it feels like for my happiness to be cut off in a shocking moment of death. Twice.

Have you ever experienced sheer joy screeched to a halt by sheer disappointment?  What are your subsequent emotions?

David was angry...David was now afraid of the Lord... ~verses 8a and 9a

Angry? check.  Afraid?  check.

As Beth Moore writes at this point in the study, "Devastation that should have been celebration is almost more than we can take.  We are simply and understandably unprepared...but we must not let anger or fear be our last feeling on a matter either.  Neither can be sustained in our systems without turning to poison." 

Since losing my little ones my daily life lesson has been learning to trust God again and it has been a much longer road than I ever expected.  The waiting for God to turn my mourning into dancing has also taken much longer than anticipated.  Again, David experiences something similar...

David was now afraid of the Lord, and he asked, “How can I ever bring the Ark of the Lord back into my care?”  So David decided not to move the Ark of the Lord into the City of David. Instead, he took it to the house of Obed-edom of Gath.  The Ark of the Lord remained there in Obed-edom’s house for three months, and the Lord blessed Obed-edom and his entire household. ~Verses 9-11

These 3 verses I have skipped entirely in the past...but Beth Moore points out something I can absolutely identify with:  while David was in pain, God chose to bless SOMEONE ELSE. 

This I know.  With every pregnancy announcement, new birth photo, and adoption story I watch God bless others with children while I continue to wait in pain.  I know that jealousy and it burns deep.

So even though he disobeyed God causing pain to himself and the people around him, how did the Man After God's Own Heart choose to respond to the Lord's blessing amidst pain? 

Then King David was told, “The Lord has blessed Obed-edom’s household and everything he has because of the Ark of God.” So David went there and brought the Ark of God from the house of Obed-edom to the City of David with a great celebration. After the men who were carrying the Ark of the Lord had gone six steps, David sacrificed a bull and a fattened calf.  And David danced before the Lord with all his might, wearing a priestly garment.  So David and all the people of Israel brought up the Ark of the Lord with shouts of joy and the blowing of rams’ horns.  ~Verses 12-15

His anger and fear were melted by seeing the goodness of God in the blessing of another.  Instead of being paralyzed in jealousy he learned that God is not eternally angry...something he would later write many Psalms about:  The Lord is good.  His faithful love endures forever.  (Ps 106:1, Ps 136, Ps 117:2, Ps 100:5 and also 1 Chron 16:34, Exra 3:11, Jeremiah 33:11)

Beth writes, "Had David not had such a heart for God, he could have been jealous, bitter and flooded with resentment.  Few things will test our hearts more thoroughly than God's shameless blessing over other lives when we're enduring a time of hardship and perhaps chastisement." 

At this point in my study I was in tears, sharing that last statement on Facebook and feeling thoroughly but lovingly challenged to examine my heart before the Lord.

Letting her last statement echo in my heart she then switches gears to the New Testament and proves AGAIN that scripture I've always been familiar with can speak in a fresh new way to my heart.  Catch this gem:

The disciples of John the Baptist told John about everything Jesus was doing. So John called for two of his disciples, and he sent them to the Lord to ask him, “Are you the Messiah we’ve been expecting, or should we keep looking for someone else?”John’s two disciples found Jesus and said to him, “John the Baptist sent us to ask, ‘Are you the Messiah we’ve been expecting, or should we keep looking for someone else?’”  ~Luke 7:18-20 NLT

John the Baptist was currently in prison.  Have you ever asked yourself WHY John sent his disciples to ask Jesus this question?  Or have you just kept reading and completely missed the first part of this story like I'm guilty of?

The answer stunned me:  Poor John the Baptist, the forerunner of Christ, Jesus' own cousin was sitting in jail while he heard report after report of his relative performing numerous miracles elsewhere.  Could it be that in a moment of weak faith he sent his disciples to find out if Jesus really was who he said he was?  And Jesus' answer to them still echoes in my heart days later:

At that very time, Jesus cured many people of their diseases, illnesses, and evil spirits, and he restored sight to many who were blind. Then he told John’s disciples, “Go back to John and tell him what you have seen and heard—the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised to life, and the Good News is being preached to the poor. And tell him, ‘God blesses those who do not turn away because of me.’”  ~verses 21-23

The New King James version is even more clear: And blessed is he who is not offended because of Me.

Offended?  At God.  Oh yes.  I've been offended by him.  And I suspect you have also been offended at some point too.  Offended that he does not intervene when we think he should.  Offended that he did not protect.  Offended that he allowed something horrendous.  And offended that he never explains why he does some of the things he does. 

Oh that I would learn to let go of my offenses so I too can draw near to the heart of God who is good and whose faithful loves endures forever.

Do you remember what happens to John next?  He's beheaded.  yeah.  Jesus never got him out of prison.  He never heard the words that Jesus spoke to the crowd about him next:




After John’s disciples left, Jesus began talking about him to the crowds. “What kind of man did you go into the wilderness to see? Was he a weak reed, swayed by every breath of wind? Or were you expecting to see a man dressed in expensive clothes? No, people who wear beautiful clothes and live in luxury are found in palaces. Were you looking for a prophet? Yes, and he is more than a prophet. John is the man to whom the Scriptures refer when they say,

‘Look, I am sending my messenger ahead of you,
    and he will prepare your way before you.’

I tell you, of all who have ever lived, none is greater than John. Yet even the least person in the Kingdom of God is greater than he is!”  ~Verses 24-28

Let Beth's final thoughts flow over your spirit the way they did over mine:

" John was right.  Jesus did treat him differently from the masses he heard about.  Jesus caused John's blind eyes to open to the very face of God.  He caused his lame legs to dance on golden roads.  He caused his leprous sin to be cured for all eternity from its hidden lusts, secret greeds, and self-righteous boasts.  The dead were indeed raised and the forerunner of Jesus hear the best news of all: "Welcome, my good and faithful servant!  Enter into your Master's happiness!"  Sometimes there's just a bigger plan."

   
 

What the Lord has done in me...

Winter is a very difficult time for me.  Long before I experienced grief I struggled with this long, cold, dark time of year.  Seasonal depression and I go way back and for me, winter is an annual anniversary of The Dark Night of the Soul.

I'm not sure when I get to leave my winter season.  It feels like I see Spring peeking through the chilly days now and then with pops of brilliant sunlight and green shoots but just when I begin to feel the warmth seeping deeper through the layers of grief something will take me several steps back into the cold.  I'm in a constant tug of war wanting to move into the sunshine but feeling chained to the darkness.  The seasons move as they will without regard to my clock and they are not even.  Winter and Spring are not the same length.  If I were in charge of the world every day would feel like April and May.  I think January through March might be the longest 90 days of the year.  Every year.

So my counselor challenged me the other day to make a list of things that God has done since losing Jaxson.  I'm following her instructions and making myself blog this list as an act of obedience as I have no desire to count blessings today but I know I will feel better if I do.  Makes me think of Ann Voskamp in 1,000 Gifts.  Even she didn't feel like counting some days...

“Losses do that. One life-loss can infect the whole of a life. Like a rash that wears through our days, our sight becomes peppered with black voids. Now everywhere we look, we only see all that isn’t: holes, lack, deficiency.”  
“Lament is a cry of belief in a good God, a God who has His ear to our hearts, a God who transfigures the ugly into beauty. Complaint is the bitter howl of unbelief in any benevolent God in this moment, a distrust in the love-beat of the Father's heart.”  
“That which tears open our souls, those holes that splatter our sight, may actually become the thin, open places to see through the mess of this place to the heart-aching beauty beyond. To Him. To the God whom we endlessly crave.”  
“It is in the dark that God is passing by. The bridge and our lives shake not because God has abandoned, but the exact opposite: God is passing by. God is in the tremors. Dark is the holiest ground, the glory passing by. In the blackest, God is closest, at work, forging His perfect and right will. Though it is black and we can't see and our world seems to be free-falling and we feel utterly alone, Christ is most present to us...”  
“When we lay the soil of our hard lives open to the rain of grace and let joy penetrate our cracked and dry places, let joy soak into our broken skin and deep crevices, life grows. How can this not be the best thing for the world? For us?”
― Ann Voskamp, One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are

In no particular order:

1.  God has awakened a love for gardening in me that I didn't have before.  He meets me in my yard.  We talk about Jaxson as I work my hands in the dirt.  Being outside in my yard and garden with my plants is the single most therapeutic thing I've discovered since losing him and it's one of the only places I am nearly guaranteed to feel the presence of God.

2. God has spared me an endless list of insensitive comments others have experienced but that I, thankfully, have not.  I can count on one hand the number of truly insensitive things that have popped thoughtlessly from someone's lips.  I know I have been blessed to have much kindness or quiet gentleness heaped on me in the face of loss.

3.  God has rearranged my thinking about the afterlife.  As a Christian I believe in heaven and hell but rarely consider them in my day to day life.  I have an much bigger awareness now of the reality of eternity and how it will be spent by both myself and those I love. 

4.  God created a sort of inside-joke with me.  I won't share what it is.  It's a private sort of "wink" he sends that only I understand.

5.  God is endlessly patient with me.  I keep going around the same tree over and over and over and over and while I am harsh with myself he always sticks around long enough for me to calm down and ask if we are good and I am answered with peace.

6.  God has kept Jaxson's memory alive in other people.  It's been over 2.5 years since he left us and people STILL post pictures of birds on my Facebook wall, send me cards or notes, share bird tracks in the snow or sand that they see, make me pillows (!!!), buy me bird gifts, send me quotes or book recommendations or articles that they think I will like. 

7.  God has kept my marriage together.  I have not added a crumbling relationship to the burdens in my heart.

8.  God has given me a steady stream of happy things to look forward to over the years.  Trips with family, shopping days to Wenatchee or Spokane, girl's nights, Bunko, Bachelor TV nights, Bible Studies, coffee dates to catch up over good conversation, holidays, road trips, date nights, and on it goes.  Small things, big things.  He knows I need stuff to look forward to and he provides.

9.  God sends me worship songs at very opportune times.  I'm generally spoken to better through music than through just about any other medium so to discover a song that speaks to where I am always feel like a gift from God for me directly. 

10.  God reminds me that he hasn't forgotten about me just about the time that I'm about to give up.  This is a difficult thing to write about because it's wrought with my own feelings of failure.  It is SO HARD to trust God when you are grieving.  When I have a bad day I get overwhelmed by emotion and tend to spiral into angry tears fighting my way through jumbled, messy words repeating themselves in my head.  I want to speak words of life but I'm fighting not to be taken under by words of death.  God seems silent and far away.  Then just when I'm wrung out something always happens.  A whisper in my spirit.  A lyric.  A quote.  Scripture.  Or just a thought that I'm not alone.  That God is nearby.  That this season will eventually change and my grief won't last forever.  Something will remind me that God is still writing my story and he isn't finished yet.  Hope.  It takes much longer than I want it to and I feel like I should be faster at opening up to this whisper.  But at least it happens.  At least He isn't silent forever.

11. God gives me extra grace with certain relationships when they are pregnant.  Namely my sister but there have been a couple of others.  Every single announcement is hard and takes some adjustment.  There have been some baby showers I simply have not been able to attend.  But not every pregnancy has been painful the whole way through.  I was able to rejoice in the birth of my nephew and I love him dearly. 

12.  God has opened my eyes to thankfulness on a level I didn't prioritize before.  I know that I am a very blessed person.  I live in a free country, have all my physical needs met, am married to a wonderful man and have wonderful relationships.  It's pretty easy to be grateful for all the big things.  But in grief there is power in counting small miracles.  I completed 100 Thankful Days on Facebook late last year and it taught me to identify all the myriad of things I have to be thankful for every single day.  Even on the very worst days there was something to be counted. 

13.  God enabled me to go on the trip of a lifetime through the generosity of a dear friend.  I never would have been able to afford it but I needed that break from my life.  I needed an adventure and something amazing to look forward to.  I still think about how healing that time was with such a Kindred Spirit. 

14.   God has brought me a lot of prayer warriors...people who say they are praying for me; for us.  Even people I didn't know prayed have told me they pray for me.  What a selfless thing to do...to remember someone's sadness when you appeal to God in your prayers.  It humbles me that we are thought of.

15.  God helps me handle more than I think I can handle.  It always feels like it's too much.  But I'm still here.  I still have good days.  Against all the darkness I haven't given up hope that we will parent little people someday.

I got this

Ken and I recently had an opportunity come up that was a win-win regardless of which way it ended up going.

How rare is that?!

Usually when a potential change comes my way I have a decidedly specific outcome that I desire.  I can't even muster up must creativity to envision an outcome that deviates even slightly from what I want to happen.

And so my prayers end up looking something like this: "Lord, please make (THIS ONE SPECIFIC THING) happen in this (EXACT) way. Amen."

How often does that actually happen?!

sigh.

Good thing God always knows what is really best for me and ignores me when I beg for whatever delights my fancy at that moment. 

This particular situation I found incredibly refreshing, though.  I really didn't have a preference for a particular outcome.  I could see very good things coming from it happening with a few downfalls that are to be expected and I could see incredibly good things from the alternative with a couple disappointments thrown in.  Either way the outcome was far from perfect but still a cool change and worth pursuing.

So instead of having a carefully-worded prayer ready to repeat over and over and over and over again, I felt nothing but peace over whatever God had planned.  He knows.  He can see into our future and know what we would need and when we would need it.  He knows what kinds of change we can handle right now and which ones we can't.  He knows what will fulfill us and provide for us.

Either way we can't lose.

GOSH!  Why don't I ALWAYS look at my life like that?  In this particular set of circumstances I found it so easy to just rest and let God decide what to do.  He would make the right door open or close depending on his plan.  I didn't really care which way it went.  Why don't I always feel that way?  Do you know how much stress I could save myself if I approached every day like this?  "OK, God.  Do your thing." 

When we lost Jaxson, my Kindred Spirit Tami told me that she was arguing with God over what had happened (I really love that she took on the Almighty God over our loss...she always has my back) and she told me that in the middle of her rant with Him, He told her very clearly, "I got this." 

And lately those words have been echoing in my spirit over and over.  He's got this.  He's got us.  He's got me.  And everything little thing is going to be OK.